The Heart Outside
by rhyejess
Summary: AU set in modernday Minneapolis, MN. Jack and Ennis have a baby through a surrogate mother.
1. Chapter 1: Planting Trees

**Disclaimer:** The characters belong to Annie Proulx, and I make no profit.  
**AN:** Many thanks to my beta, carbyville. I have no idea how often this will update, though.

Chapter One: Planting Trees

"Shit."

"What?"

"This is not shit."

"Huh?"

"I seen a lot of shit in my life and this--"

She started squalling.

"Can you get her to shut that up?"

"Can I get her to shut that up. What the hell." Jack cradled Antoinette's head and laid the crying baby back onto the changing table. He rose his voice over her high pitch. "You know, I didn't even want a kid."

"Yeah, and I wanted a boy."

"Well then, how'd we end up in this mess?"

"Lost our marbles, guess," Ennis left the room.

Jack was left laughing as he wiped the orange-green pudding-like goop from Toni's behind. He called down the hallway, "You oughta come see this stuff. It's like mashed yams."

"Thanks, I'd rather not," Ennis called back.

Jack carried the newly-quiet baby-powder-fresh bundle of blankets back to the living room. "Jesus Christ, why do I have to do all the diaper-changing?" He lowered Toni gently into Ennis's arms.

"Don't mind doin' it," Ennis offered.

"Well, it's not a pretty sight. Smells like goddamn roadkill or worse."

"Said I don't mind doin' it."

Jack eyed Ennis, who was carefully cradling the baby girl, looking down into her eyes. "Well, I'd be happy to switch with you."

"Alright then," Ennis nodded. "You can do the feeding."

When Toni fell asleep, they laid her back in her crib and Ennis took Jack into the kitchen and showed him the best way to heat a bottle of formula and test it to make sure it wasn't hot. Not three minutes after, they both crawled into bed. Ennis fell fast asleep to the silence of the baby monitor, despite the fact that it was two in the afternoon. Jack, though, stayed awake, lost in thought.

Once upon a time, a short while ago, life had been very different in the Twist/del Mar household. Ennis, junior manager at a concrete contractor, and Jack, starting out in a high-paying architecture company, would have been spending this Saturday afternoon hiking, probably, or having sex and then going out for a nice dinner or to catch a show, though Ennis preferred to stay at home, maybe invite their friends over for a barbecue.

But as they'd hit their late-twenties, their barbecues with friends had begun to change. Baby Sabina had been a novelty, had come to all the parties and been cooed on by all the adults. Pretty soon, though, she wasn't alone. Nearly a quarter of their friends had kids by the time Ennis and Jack were hitting thirty, and inevitably, it'd got them wondering about their own future.

Jack had always seen it as just the two of them together. Ennis, though, had always wanted a child, or even children. He never spoke about it much. He knew that wasn't what Jack wanted, and Jack knew Ennis knew. It was a whole unspoken minefield they never ventured into, but eventually whatever it was that drove that desire in Ennis had forced him to cut fence, to trespass into the DMZ and drag them both onto the minefield.

One night after their friends had left a backyard barbecue, Ennis said, real quiet-like, "Well, why _couldn't_ we have a baby? I mean... Jack, would you like to live your whole life never knowin' what it's like to be a parent?"

Jack's jaw had dropped. "I just wasn't planning on giving _up_ my life to be a parent."

"You heard what Prue said. Said it was the most rewarding..." But Ennis hadn't said more just then. And yet, he'd brought it up, nibbled at the edges of it, day in and day out for months, until finally Jack sat him down, big blue eyes large with a desire to understand, and they'd had a long, long talk about parenthood, kids, the future.

It wasn't the first. They had another talk. And another talk. Sometimes they devolved into fights. Sometimes into sex. Sometimes Jack was one hundred percent convinced. Sometimes it was Ennis who was backing out. But somewhere along the line they had both come to accept that this was something that was going to happen for them.

They were only thirty-three when they started to look into the options. It wasn't the easiest thing in the world, but their money made a lot of the headway for them. They were by no means poor. Fights and fights later, they settled on the idea of surrogacy. Ennis could not give up the desire for a biological offspring, it seemed, and Jack could understand that perspective, though he was wary about inviting a third party-- a mother-- into their relationship and into control of the baby. They found themselves an adoption lawyer, though, who recommended a center in San Diego she'd worked with once.

Surrogacy through the center cost an arm and a leg, but hooked them up with a local married woman. Jack felt more than a little stupid masturbating into a paper cup to make a baby, but the plan was he and Ennis both would, they'd mix all that sperm together, and what would happen, would happen. They'd foolishly thought maybe they wouldn't know whose the baby was.

What had happened was Antoinette, who had delicate feather-light blonde curls just barely coming in. Hair like her daddy's. Jack found he didn't mind knowing his boys had lost the race. And he certainly didn't mind holding Ennis's baby girl and calling her theirs.

Jack's company was happy to give him parenting leave, as they called it. Eight weeks paid, more if he wanted, unpaid, but Jack took the eight paid and decided by then he'd have hopefully found someone to stay with the baby while he and Ennis worked. They were going to interview for nannies. They weren't _rich_, by any means (especially after paying for the entire pre-natal expenses Jesus Christ! babies cost a lot), so it'd have to be someone affordable for the daytime only, but both Jack and Ennis had day jobs they had to keep.

On the ninth of July, 2007, there'd been a frantic race to the hospital. A red-haired, green-eyed young wife, who had agreed to be uninvolved after the baby's birth, released Antoinette Patricia del Mar - Twist after 18 hours of hard labor into the arms of her new parents.

Their lives had changed forever in a moment. Ennis took a week off from work, and that was how things had been. Toni, luckily, slept most of the time, but there'd been a lot of assembling of baby furniture that they'd stupidly left to the very last minute, and simply a lot of learning, reading, and exhaustion. Jack didn't know how they were going to get by when Toni was actually staying awake at all hours. The week had been busy with family as well: Jack's mom and dad visited, and Ennis's sister stopped by and brought food. Ennis's brother and his family lived in Iowa but were already talking about coming up.

None of their family had expected this particular gay couple to be entrenched in their ultra-modern home with a baby girl.

Jack had been spending a lot of time baby-proofing things as well, which pissed him the hell off because he had spent so much time putting out all this fragile crap in the first place when they'd moved here several years ago.

Everything since Monday had been a whirlwind that didn't seem real or permanent. Toni was like a house guest and surely she'd leave when she was done fucking with their lives, right? Then they could get back to their normal schedules, clean the house, go out to eat and see shows and host barbecues, and laugh about the time Toni came to stay for a week. Only Jack knew that wasn't how it was going to be. Her visit wasn't going to be over for a long, long time yet.

Ennis rolled over and wrapped Jack in warm arms, making a muffled noise in his sleep. Jack smiled. They had love to spare, though, didn't they, and didn't Toni deserve it? _Yeah_, Jack thought, remembering her tiny little fingers and knowing already a kind of achy need to feel them curl around his own calloused ones. _Toni deserves everything._ What was the point of saving money, and having a great home, and decorating it beautifully, and going on hikes in the summertimes, if you didn't have anyone to pass it on to when you weren't there any more? He and Ennis were so close they were like one person, sometimes-- when they weren't screaming at each other. But they had something to share, something they could give back to the world-- love.

Jack leaned over and kissed Ennis forehead, then mouth. Ennis, even in his sleep, returned the kiss wholeheartedly. Jack smiled. He squished his face against Ennis's cheek and whispered, "Now _that's_ one daddy I'd like to fuck," chuckling to himself as he turned and got out of bed.

Jack padded down the hallway and carefully opened the door to Toni's room. He found her fast asleep, breathing quietly, and he pulled up a chair and watched her for the longest while.

"Hey baby girl," Jack whispered. "I was thinking, maybe you should be a musician. How about that? I'll buy you a violin tomorrow." He smiled down at her. "Or a professional golfer. They make a lot of money. Or a cowgirl. Yee to the fucking haw. Your daddy doesn't like it when I say that word around you. Says you need boundaries so you can break 'em when you're older. What do you think? You think I'm encouraging you to get tattoos and ride around with bikers?"

Jack sat back against the chair and waited for a moment more. Finally he stood. "Anyway, you see your daddy, tell him I'm glad he talked me into this."

Jack went into the bathroom hallway to pee.

* * *

The soliloquy ended, and Ennis laughed at the baby monitor. Jackass probably didn't even realize it was on.

* * *

Ennis stumbled downstairs sometime later. He heard Jack loading the dishwasher, and then talking, "I just cannot believe they fucking _killed_ him." 

"China is not exactly known as the paradigm of human rights and due process." Ennis winced when he heard his sister's voice. This was the fourth time this week she'd been over, and he was getting kind of tired of her attitude, like she really thought the two of them were totally incapable of taking care of one baby. And not just one baby, _their_ baby, _their fucking baby to make their own parenting mistake with_.

"But, could you imagine a world where every corrupt politician is executed?"

Ennis arrived in the kitchen just in time to see Olivia shrug it off. "Maybe it would be a better place if we did."

Jack was shaking his head.

Ennis cleared his throat, and Olivia spun. "Ennis! I brought dinner."

"You don't have to."

"I know."

Ennis forced a smile, and caught Jack casting a half-smile half-grimace at him over Olivia's shoulder.

"How's the angel?" Olivia asked.

"Sleeping like one," Jack interrupted. "So what'd you bring us?" Jack started poking the paper bag she'd left on the counter.

"Just some soup I made."

Jack and Ennis nodded in unison. Luckily, Olivia's cooking was pretty darn good. They managed to convince her to stay for soup, and then ushered her out the door before things could go much farther. Toni slept through the whole affair.

She woke around nine at night for a couple hours. Ennis changed her while Jack fixed a bottle. They settled in front of the TV, and Jack held his very own baby girl-- not a concept that had soaked in yet, but still one that made his heart beat faster at the merest thought-- while she ate. He fixed a cloth onto his shoulder and burped her, pausing to laugh at some joke a comic had made on the TV.

Ennis flipped the station quickly.

"I was watching that!"

"Not appropriate for her."

"The hell? It's just sound to her."

"You want her to grow up talking like that comedian?"

"Well, I'd need a hell of a lot of Depends if she did. I thought he was funny."

Ennis grumbled.

"You hear that, Toni? Forget what I said earlier. Ennis says you have to be a comedian."

"That's not what I said."

Jack laughed and went back to burping. "Hey Ennis, I think she said something!"

"Huh?"

"What's that, Toni? Ennis is an asshole?"

Ennis kicked Jack in the foot, and Jack chuckled.

When she was done being burped, Toni fell asleep in Jack's arms. Ennis leaned against him and fell asleep on his shoulder. Jack had always thought of himself and Ennis as a family, but now he saw that they really were a family, and no matter what happened to them in the unknown years to come ahead, they'd have to stick together. They were what each other had to rely on.


	2. Chapter 2: Pouring a Foundation

**Disclaimer:** The characters belong to Annie Proulx, and I make no profit.

**AN:** Many thanks to my beta, carbyville. I have no idea how often this will update, though. In the timeline, it's currently early mid-July, 2007.

Chapter Two: Pouring a Foundation

"Hello?"

"Jack? It's Naomi."

"Hey, what's up?"

"You have _got_ to get in here."

"What are you talking about? You know I can't--"

"Jack, Billings is coming in tomorrow, and Craig doesn't understand the blueprints. You need to come in."

"Naomi, I can't." As if punctuating the sentiment, Toni woke, and, as, as had become her modus operandi over the last two weeks, began screaming. Originally, she'd been such a joy, sleeping a lot, cute when awake. She'd train her wide, blue, unfocused eyes on the things around her, trying to take in a world of colors, motions, and patterns. But weeks had passed and her little brain had decided that, by now, the appropriate reaction to everything was to scream bloody murder. The fourteen baby books they'd gotten at the shower their friends'd thrown them warned them about this, but didn't provide a lot in the way of help. Jack high-tailed it to the nursery.

"Is that her?"

"No, that's my next-door neighbor. I always said she's a big baby, didn't I?"

Naomi laughed. "You have to send in a picture so we can put her up on the bulletin."

"Not sure we should be up on the bulletin."

"You already are! We just need a picture."

"Oh. Alright. I'll send one."

"There's already a stack of cards on your desk."

Jack smiled. He'd found such a good place to work. It warmed his heart. The only problem with it was that everyone there was workaholics, and they expected him to be one too. Which, ordinarily, maybe he was, though more than likely just from the pressure to be so.

"Anyway, you have got to find some way to come in. None of this solves the Billings problem."

Jack tucked the phone under his chin while he changed his baby girl. "I can't leave Toni here all alone, and I don't think you want me bringing a screaming baby into the office. Elsdon would pitch a fit."

"Point," Naomi groaned.

"Tell you what. If he doesn't mind it too much, and it isn't going to take too long, send Craig over here with the blueprints. I can't leave here, but I've got a table. No reason I can't explain them to him right here."

"Jack, you're brilliant. A lifesaver. I'll send him right over."

"Yup. I'm not going to be anywhere," Jack grimaced. Truth was, he couldn't remember the last time he'd made a decent foray out of the house. He'd showered yesterday evening, at least. He would have to put some proper clothes on, straighten up the kitchen and living room, maybe try to eat something.

Naomi took down the directions to his house. Jack bounced Toni the entire time, recognizing in her slight gurgling noise the beginnings of her next screaming fit. She was probably hungry by now. So was he, dammit. But feeding her and burping her would have to come first, and by then Craig would be here, so maybe he could just grab a banana or something. It seemed now like every day was some sort of strategic test of his ability to multi task. Craig was a little-needed addition to the intricate ballet, but he had to make sure he had a job to go back to when his leave was up.

When Craig arrived, a very unshowered Jack met him at the door, stuffing Pringles into his mouth from a tube clutched under one arm.

"Come on in." Jack motioned towards the interior. In reality, the house wasn't _too_ much of a mess. As long as you stayed out of the kitchen and bedrooms.

Toni was in her crib. When Jack'd laid her there mere minutes before, she'd been wide awake and had looked pretty uninterested in napping, but at least she wasn't' screaming.

He led Craig back to his office, armed with chips, coffee, and baby monitor. In the past, he'd always strictly adhered to the rule of not bringing food and drink into the office, but he'd never anticipated having to work while starving and on so little sleep.

Jack managed to get about halfway through his meeting with Craig, Craig's wide dark eyes and nodding black hair not, in Jack's experience with the man, truly indicative of his degree of comprehension, when first a gurgle (Jack held his breath), then a moan (Jack cringed), then a full-blown wail issued from the tinny speaker of the baby monitor. Craig looked up at Jack with a smart ass smile. "Guess fatherhood sucks, huh?"

Jack spun his office chair around once, then said with exasperation-- he had never cared for Craig's know-it-all attitude, although in most circumstances he was easy enough to work with-- "No it does not. Now if you'll excuse me, I think this one's mashed yams."

And it was. He didn't know if she had different cries or if he was just getting used to her schedule: shitting after eating after sleeping. He changed her quickly and with minimal breathing while in the bio-containment zone, but as soon as he laid her back onto her yellow-on-yellow polka dot crib sheets, she began to fuss.

"Aww, what's your issue, baby girl? You can tell Daddy." he picked her up again and she quieted down in easily under three seconds, so he laid her down again. Whereupon, she immediately fixed him in her big, blue, crossed eyes and started making grumpy noises again.

"Oh, no, no the 'do what I say' game. Not now, okay." Jack lifted her, feeling her tiny weight in his hand as he cradled her tiny butt, wrapped in a tiny diaper. "Daddy has to work so you can have all sorts of expensive teenage electronics when you grow up." Her fussing, by now, had grown silent.

Jack had a feeling he knew how this was going to play out by now, but he put her down one more time to be certain. Sure enough, she started crying. "Shit," he cursed. "You're an annoying little fucker. Don't tell Ennis I said that." Jack sighed and lifted Toni up once more to carry her down to his office. If he'd been iffy about having Pringles in there, there were no words for the kind of havoc he feared a crying, shitting, puking, peeing newborn could create. But he either had to brave that or to work around her squalling, and he knew which would be easier. He stopped in his and Ennis's bedroom to grab the baby carrier and rushed downstairs to meet a glazed-eyed Craig.

It didn't matter that Jack had the carrier, though, because Toni insisted on being held, or else. Jack and Craig managed. Toni's eyes glazed over before long and she was breathing heavy and peacefully on Jack's shoulder. The deep rumbling of his voice, he guessed, as he spoke to Craig, combined with his body warmth and heartbeat, must have dropped her off to sleep. Jack and Craig were nearly done when Jack was able to slip Toni into her carrier. Jack marveled at how nakedly Craig admired her porcelain beauty before he left. Jack turned to his little girl with fresh eyes to see the faint blush on her cheek, the way she suckled the air as she slept, her eyes scrunched tight, fists clenched, impossibly-light blond fuzz sticking up from her head. He ran dark-haired fingers through the fuzz. he knew he shouldn't touch her as she slept, but in such a peaceful state, resisting that temptation was too difficult.

The front door swung open, squealing its need for oil. Jack leaned back in the chair to watch Toni, waiting for Ennis to find him. They knew no yelling happened if it could be avoided.

"Hey." Ennis popped his head into the door after a good five minutes. Jack had heard Ennis's footsteps has he checked every room before this one.

"Hey."

"You..." Ennis flicked his gaze from Jack to Toni to Jack.. "You working?"

"Yeah," Jack sighed, both of their voices barely above a whisper. "The office was begging me to come in, so I had Craig run out here. I went over some blueprints with him."

"Did that work out alright?"

Jack shook his head. "It worked, but it's not an experience I'm waiting to repeat, thanks to little miss diva here."

"Hmph." Ennis placed his hands on his hips. "Well, _you're_ lookin' nice."

"Thanks. I put clean clothes on for once. At the expense of eating."

"Dressing up for Craig?," Ennis teased.

"Yup. Now back to the point. What's for dinner?"

Ennis shrugged. "Guess I can make something real quick."

"Do that. Emphasis on the quick."

They ended up with sandwiches, eating them in hushed silence while Toni slept in her carrier on the floor by Ennis.

Ennis frowned down at her. "You know she won't sleep tonight if she sleeps this much during the day."

"It's not that much. She's only been asleep for an hour."

Ennis grunted.

"She was ranting and raving all day long. It was nice to see Craig, get back into the company of adults."

"Thought you didn't like Craig?"

"Well I don't _dislike_ him. His bravado is just a bit much for me to take."

Ennis took a large bite of turkey sandwich in response.

"Still, he's a better conversationalist than your daughter over there."

"Mmmm," Ennis said by way of announcing he had something to say, reserving the next spot of conversation for himself. He chewed quickly, swallowed hard, and washed the mouthful down with a hefty swig of Leinie's Sunset Wheat. "I've been thinking about that."

"About what?"

"The way you say she's mine all the time." Ennis squinted over at Toni, as if examining her.

"She got your coloring, hair--"

"I heard you," Ennis interrupted, "I just..." He shook his head. "You don't see blue eyes like that every day, and going back into my family, we don't have them."

"The mother could've--"

"Not just that. They're, whattaya call it? With genes?"

"Recessive?"

"Yeah."

"Ennis, blond hair is recessive, too, isn't it?"

"It's not like blue eyes!"

Their voices were raised by now and Toni, still asleep, had begun to kick her feet. She let out a high-pitched noise and they both held their breath to watch her. When she seemed to slip back into a peaceful slumber, Jack whispered with force, "It's not just her hair. She _looks_ like you. Look at her."

Ennis contorted his face, grimacing at Toni. "She looks like a baby, Jack."

Jack exhaled in frustration. "Guess we'll just have to wait and see."

"Wait and see what?"

"Who she turns out looking like."

"Won't be no 'wait and see'. We decided we didn't care before we did this thing."

Jack shrugged and fixed his eyes on Toni. "I didn't say I cared. I just want to prove you wrong."

Ennis frowned deeply. "Jack, I can't do this. I don't want to do this. We already decided."

Jack watched Ennis's eyes earnestly.

"We already said she was going to be ours, not mine or yours. I don't wanna... I don't wanna know. I couldn't stand if it was just me and her--." His voice broke off, choked.

Jack sighed and grabbed one of the hands Ennis had clenched like stone around his beer bottle. "Sssh. Alright. I'm sorry. I was just having fun."

Ennis stared, unfocused and grave, and the blackness of the table top.

"Ennis. Listen to me. She's ours. I'm never going to leave you and her alone, ok? She's mine. She's my daughter, too."

Ennis's eyes, filled with worry and pain and the same fear of abandonment Jack had seen plenty of times before, met Jack's. "Sorry," Ennis croaked. "I just worry sometimes. 'Cause you didn't want her, and now you're ready to go back to work."

"I want her," Jack corrected, hurt. "Please don't say that again."

Ennis nodded stiffly.

"And I'm just not cut out for being locked in a house with a lady. If I wanted that, I wouldn't be nearly as queer as I am."

Ennis squinted at Jack.

"Jesus, it was a joke. I'm just not the stay-at-home type, I guess. I'm starting to go a little bit insane already."

"Hmph." Ennis slid back in his chair, pulling his hand out of Jack's.

"The ad runs in the paper tomorrow..."

Ennis swiped a hand over his eyes. "I still don't see why my sister couldn't do it."

"She's not going to be unemployed forever."

"Well, until she finds a job, then."

"She's been working temp jobs to make ends meet. Is she supposed to drop them?"

"We could pay her. Better to pay someone in the family than some stranger."

"I'm not sure that's so true." Jack downed the end of his beer. "I can't help but feel that actually hiring on family for pay is asking for trouble. And I bet you'd have trouble getting her to take the money, anyway. Besides, those temp jobs pay her more than we can afford to."

Ennis tilted his head to the side and stared down the kitchen floor. Jack knew it was the closest he would get to a concession.

"Furthermore," Jack added into the silence, "she already practically tries to raise Antoinette for us. I don't think I want to encourage that. Didn't we talk about all of this before?"

Ennis nodded sullenly. "Alright."

"I'll take care of it all," Jack replied, resigned.

"No, I'll help." Ennis said it quickly, like swallowing something that burned his tongue.

Jack didn't say aloud that Ennis had better help, had better show _some_ interest in who is left it watch his child-- their child-- during the day.

Just then, Toni awoke with a warning gurgle and a foghorn scream. Jack leaned back and groaned. The never ending cycle stopped for no man.


End file.
